That's not a typo in the title: this really is about your status and career as a pirate, using the "ship" suffix as in scholarship or stewardship. Basically, our captain has sent us to find a treasure known to have been hidden somewhere on this island, as a means of proving our worth. Yes, I know pirates don't actually work that way, but this is a pretty old school sort of game with old school sensibilities, and all it really wanted was an excuse to send us puzzle-solving across this island map.
Rather than have the player type in their commands, the game is entirely point-and-click, albeit with some of the same sensibilities as a standard parser adventure. A panel displays the objects in the location and in our inventory, along with the possible actions attached, which may change depending on context. It's the same gameplay as the author's 2016 IFcomp entry, Detectiveland, except that I think this take feels a little less polished. At least, I seem to remember Detectiveland having a somewhat more complex and involved storyline.
To be honest, I found myself hankering for the more hands-on approach of typing in my own commands, but I'm an old fogey and who's got to go drive the darn neighbourhood kids off his lawn.
The writing, though sparse, is effective. With the exit directions relegated to clickable buttons on a control panel, the room descriptions are free to be as brief as they like, often coming down to no more than a single sentence. There's a nod or two towards the social impact of the colonial setting that I think, lightly played though it is, gives this slightly more depth than if we were just playing with the established pirate tropes. Which we are, of course.
So there seems to be a bit going for this, yet I can't help but feel that the old school sensibility does it a disservice. It just feels a little too light. It's like a breakfast of crusty bread and cheese, all homemade, with sweet tea: I appreciate the effort and expertise, but surely there could be more to it?